


To My Little Brother

by talefeathers



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Death, Gen, Grief, Mourning, Post-War, Sensitive Topic, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-30
Updated: 2011-04-30
Packaged: 2017-10-18 20:05:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talefeathers/pseuds/talefeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All of the Weasleys are devastated in the wake of Fred's death, but Percy's guilt takes his grief and twists it into something unbearable, especially when called upon to face George's misery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To My Little Brother

I wanted to write a letter to my little brother.

 

When I watched Fred die, I thought I would never be able to feel any worse than I did then. He and George were everything I'd never had the courage to be, and I had just come to really respect them for that when Fred was torn from me, never to know. At first I couldn't see past my own pain, even though I should have known. I should have known that George wouldn't be all right.

 

I have no excuse, but part of the reason it took me so long to see the obvious is that George held himself together for a disturbingly long time. When he first saw Fred, cold and unmoving on the floor of the Great Hall, he brushed his tears aside and held on to his pain because the fight wasn't over yet. At the funeral he didn't cry, he bowed his head and bore it, because he had to stay strong for Ginny, for Ron. For Harry, who felt this loss was all his fault. For Mum, who was hurting enough already. It was a week before George finally let his grief take him, before he collapsed under the burden of his own pain, which he was stuffing away out of concern for everyone else. It was a week before I heard the sobs coming from his room.

 

Dad wanted us all together; his reasoning for it was that Mum was having a really rough time of it and he wanted us to be there for her. I think the reason that no one argued, though, was that we were _all_ having a rough time of it, and we needed to draw strength from each other.

Dinner was on the table and Dad sent me upstairs to summon George. We all tried not to treat George too differently, knowing that he would only come to resent us for it, but simply yelling up the stairs for him didn't work quite as well as it once had due to his halved hearing. My heart sank, but everyone else had had their turn already, so I trudged miserably up the stairs.

As I raised my hand to knock on his door, however, I stopped short at the sounds reaching me from the other side. It took me a dazed second to realize what the sounds were, and when I did my heart dropped to the bottom of my stomach like a stone. George was sobbing. One-hundred-percent, full-on, gasping-and-hiccuping-and-pounding-the-pillow sobbing. I panicked, knowing that I was the very last person he would want to come upon him in this state. I turned around, meaning to go back downstairs and tell the others that he wasn't hungry - they would believe me, he'd skipped several meals since that final battle - when I heard a ferocious, tear-cracked scream from behind the door followed by the sound of breaking glass. I closed my eyes, steeling myself. Because I wasn't going to lose him, too.

I tapped lightly on the door that had always been the twins', and was now just George's. "George?" I called. More sobs. Huge, all-encompassing, body-wracking sobs. "Hey, George?"

When he didn't answer after three more knocks and four more calls, I took out my wand and pointed it at the doorknob. " _Alohomora._ "

George was lying on one of the two beds that he and Fred had shared interchangeably with his good ear pressed deeply into a pillow so that he was deaf to everything but his own misery. His entire body shook with his violent sobs. Across the room a small mirror lay in pieces.

For a moment I just stood there in the doorway, taking in this wretched scene. Then I stepped tentatively forward, braced myself, and placed my hand gently on my brother's shoulder. "George?"

He opened his eyes, and the hope that I saw there for that split-instant before he didn't see Fred twisted my heart like taffy. Then it was gone like smoke, and my wisecracking, mischief-managing brother's face contorted into a mask of blind rage.

" _GET OUT OF HERE!_ " he roared in a voice that would have been menacing if it hadn't been waterlogged, leaping to his feet and pushing me so hard I almost ended up on my arse. In the distance I could hear Mum calling our names and Dad, probably holding her back, murmuring, "No, Molly. Best to let them get it out."

"George," I tried again, swallowing the lump that was rising in my throat and extending a hand towards him. I don't know if I was seeking to give help or to beg it for myself with that gesture. It might have been a little bit of both. "Georgie, I - "

" _DON'T CALL ME THAT!_ " he spat. "YOU SNIVELLING TREACHOUROUS _GIT!_ " He punched me solidly on my left cheekbone. "DON'T ACT LIKE YOU FEEL HOW I FEEL! DON'T ACT LIKE ANYTHING YOU CAN SAY OR DO CAN FIX _ANY_ OF THIS!" Another punch landed on the right side of my jaw. "I WISH IT HAD BEEN _YOU!_ YOU WERE RIGHT THERE, WHY COULDN'T IT HAVE BEEN _YOU?!_ " He grabbed my shirtfront and lifted me off my feet, slamming me into the nearest wall, causing the foundations of the house to rattle and photos and shelves and Mum's family clock to crash to the floor. " _WHY DID FRED HAVE TO DIE?!_ " he screamed, his face inches from mine, his voice hoarse and cracking as a new wave of tears cascaded down his cheeks. His shaking hands let go of me and I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor, head bowed. He stood over me, chest hitching with sobs, and whimpered, "Why did I have to live?"

He staggered backwards and sank back onto the bed, his head in his hands, and I heard myself say, "I'm sorry, George. I'm so, so sorry." I could feel the lump rising back in my throat and my eyes began to itch with tears. "You're right. It should have been me. It should have been me and I'm so sorry, George."

"Tell _Fred_ that," George said sullenly. He curled back up in the bed, pulling the covers over his head in a heartbreakingly childlike manner. I wiped my eyes, got shakily to my feet, and trudged out of the room without responding.

 

Mum called my name the moment I closed the door behind me, her tone worried and exhausted, but I ignored her and headed straight for my room. I sat down at my desk for the first time since I'd been back, and for a moment all I could do was wonder at how something once so familiar had become so foreign. Then, before I could get any second thoughts, I grabbed for a piece of parchment and a quill and I wrote the letter I so desperately wanted to write. I wrote the words that I had been trying to write for eight days. I wrote a letter to my little brother.

 

 _Dear Fred..._


End file.
